Latin American Economy & Business - December 2018

Brazil: World Bank’s Levy Returns to Run BNDES

Joaquim Levy, the World Banks’s Chief Financial Officer, has been appointed to head the Brazilian state development bank, BNDES. Like the future economy minister Paulo Guedes, and the future head of Petrobras, Roberto Castello Branco, Levy is a University of Chicago-educated economist. His nomination provoked a certain amount of resistance from president-elect Jair Bolsonaro, due to Levy’s ties to previous Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT) administrations. The fact Guedes was able to push his appointment through anyway shows Bolsonaro has considerable faith in his economic guru.